


Fullmetal Hero

by Square_Pancake



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia
Genre: Bakugou is a Bully, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Midoriya Izuku Has a Quirk, No knowledge of FMA needed, Or at least a Quirk-like power, Supportive Midoriya Inko
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2019-02-04
Packaged: 2019-09-14 17:28:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 17,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16917216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Square_Pancake/pseuds/Square_Pancake
Summary: "Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is Alchemy's first law of Equivalent Exchange."Izuku meets the Gate when he is 12.  He pays a very different toll than the one Edward Elric once paid.





	1. The Gate

Izuku was twelve when he met the Gate. 

 

The day had been fairly ordinary.  Perhaps Kacchan had been feeling particularly energetic as he and his cronies chased Izuku onto the roof, but even that was not unprecedented.  The way they shoved him as he tried to retreat was normal. The explosion just as he made it to the stairs was practically a trademark Kacchan move.

 

He could dimly see the figures of his tormentors, eyes wide with shock as he tripped on the first step and fell down the stairs. “I don’t want to die,” was his final thought before he hit the bottom.  

 

* * *

 

Izuku did not remember waking.  The white filling his vision felt as though it had always been there; he struggled to clarify vague concerns into concrete thoughts.  It was easier to just let the questions drain from his mind until he floated, suspended in nothingness. 

 

The door materializing in the endless white expanse was surprising.  Even though it appeared to be the only fixed point around him, Izuku made no effort to get closer. The ominous power emanating from the structure overwhelming any curiosity that he could muster. 

 

A feeling of being watched prickled across Izuku’s senses and he spun, immediately spotting a glowing, featureless figure.  The shadows that defined its form seemed to grant the void some sense of depth, allowing the figure to sit casually as it grinned at Izuku. 

 

The teeth visible in an otherwise featureless face should not have been threatening. They were.

 

“Hello. This is a surprise. Your route here was not the normal one. Yet you too will need to pay the toll if you want to get back.” 

 

“Wh-who are you? Where am I?” Izuku managed to ask.  Echoes of his stutters flitted through the not-air around him.

 

“I am the called by many names.

I am the world, 

I am the universe, 

I am god, 

I am truth, 

I am all, 

I am one, 

and 

I am you.” 

 

Izuku shook his head in incomprehension.  The figure continued, “As for where you are? You are where the Truth holds domain.”

 

“I don’t understand.” Alarm was rising in Izuku’s gut.  The last clear emotion he could remember was a nauseating mix of fear and panic.

 

“Do you not?” A sinister edge colored the voice.

 

Izuku could sense the doors opening behind him.  _ They should make a noise, as heavy as they look _ , he thought inanely.  He felt the atmosphere eddying thickly around him as he slowly turned.  A huge, inhuman eye peered at him through endless darkness. 

 

He could hear the figure behind him cackle, “ I will show you the Truth! ”.  Tendrils of darkness snaked around him, and Izuku was pulled towards the abyss.

 

Izuku screamed as information poured into his mind.  Brief images expanded to encompass all his senses and forced their way in. The information itself was tantalizing.  The skills and knowledge necessary to be a hero. The power contained that went far beyond any concepts Izuku had ever considered. But the overwhelming deluge was mind breaking. Izuku barely managed to cling to some sense of self in the maelstrom. “It’s too much! Please, stop it!” he pleaded.  

 

“Do you see child?  Striving to reach further, what exactly are you prepared to sacrifice for this dream? For alchemy?”

 

“All men are not created equal” echoed in Izuku’s mind.  The jeers and laughter of his classmates, the quiet sadness of his mother, the slightly shame-faced avoidance of his teachers, it all swirled together, tainting the dream he held fixed in his mind. The history,  _ the truth _ of his experiences threatened to destroy his goal utterly.

 

Izuku desperately latched onto one of the questions still ringing in his mind.  What exactly was he prepared to sacrifice for his dream? The word ‘anything’ was perched on Izuku’s lips before he managed to choke it back.  There was no question that if he told this entity that he would give anything, it would take everything.

 

Instead, Izuku managed to ask, “what do you want? What do you need?”

 

The answer echoed back in Izuku’s own voice, “A hero should be prepared to give up everything to save people.  Everything. I want to be a hero.”

 

Izuku stayed mute.  As no answer was offered, he could feel pieces of his very self splintering off into the void, chasing the particles of light and knowledge.  He forced himself back together, wrenching himself out of the daze.

 

His mind was still burning with the influx of information. Instinctively, he knew that without paying a toll, the suffering would be pointless; all knowledge would be stripped from him.  Through the pressure, Izuku gasped, “I will give you part of myself, I will leave part of myself here and take part of the Truth back with me.”

  
  


“Yes, perhaps that is the best option.  If you believe in heroes, should you not be willing to give your place to one more worthy? One stronger?  Give me your memories. I will send someone else in your place. You will still be known as Izuku, and you will be a greater hero than you can imagine.”  

 

As the entity spoke, a young man flickered into view.  Golden-eyed and golden haired, he stood between his world and destruction.  Izuku knew that he could accept, he could rest here in the void, and this man would stand in his place outside the Gate.

 

For a long moment, Izuku struggled with the temptation.  He was so tired of the world and hopelessness. Even if he was replaced, it was like becoming a hero; really wouldn’t it be best to use his life to give the world a true hero?  Suddenly, what had seemed to be merely a spectre stretched out his hand and latched onto Izuku.

 

With a touch, the blond-haired man managed to slow the relentless pull of the Truth.  A single touch was saving him, Izuku realized. Perhaps letting the other take over was the correct choice. His eyes slid shut.

 

The hand that had reached for him was joined by a second one, and suddenly both gripped Izuku’s shoulders firmly, and shook him until he opened his eyes.  

 

Panicked green eyes met fierce gold ones.  “Stop it! I am not going to take your place in your world kid. I’m not a hero, I’m human.  That's the only thing I've ever been, just a simple human that couldn't save a little girl, not even with alchemy.”  

 

Memories surged into Izuku’s mind, tinted with very human fears and regrets.  There was too much for which Izuku had no context, so he simply accepted the assertion.

 

The golden eyes lit with anger as he shouted at Izuku.  “You were brought before the gate- sacrificing your life to bring me into your world is not the right answer!”  The anger was galvanizing.

 

“If he doesn’t pay a toll, then he’ll just leave here- seeing the gate and then never remembering the awful power he could have wielded.” The voice sounded from everywhere and nowhere.

 

The small amount of time the other man had bought him began to dwindle at the reminder; the seductive chaos of the Truth tugged at Izuku. “Then what is point of coming here? What is the right answer?  I’ve seen the Gate, but unless I offer a toll, it’s meaningless,” Izuku muttered.

 

The other human laughed, though there was no humor in it. “Equivalent exchange, right?  How old are you, kid?”

 

“Twelve,” Izuku answered cautiously. 

 

“Not ideal, but we can make that work.”  One hand released its grip from Izuku’s shoulders, and the other man turned until he was standing behind Izuku in a supportive stance as they both faced the Truth.  “You wanted his memories, right?”

 

The faceless entity cackled.  “Oh Edward, I want his everything. And I will have it eventually.  He’s so much like you- he will come back to the Gate. He cannot help it.”

 

Izuku could feel the newly named Edward’s hand tighten briefly at the assertion. “What is his path here...no, wait.  He can figure that out later. His toll here and now. Take his last three years of memories from him.” Izuku wanted to protest, but Edward continued. “And in exchange, I offer him access to my own corresponding memories.  Equivalent Exchange.”

 

It was almost impossible to determine, but Izuku was certain the entity was amused.  “Trying to win again, Edward? Yes, yes, I see. Perhaps in time the child will understand why this was an Equivalent Exchange.  The toll and trade are accepted!”

 

Dark tendrils began to drag Izuku away from the protective presence at his back.  As he fought instinctively to get free, Edward leaned towards him, and whispered directly in his ear, “this was the only option I could think of that would let you benefit from the Gate.  Use what you learn and use it wisely.”

 

The void splintered around them, and Izuku found himself on his knees before the closing doors of the Gate.  He reached out towards the golden light behind the Gate, only to be met with the grinning face of Truth.

 

Izuku recoiled.  Truth’s leer didn’t change.  White hands gripped Izuku’s head and he screamed as he felt something rip free and something else try to shape itself into the jagged holes in his mind.  The dark tendrils reached out and grabbed at the not quite material remnants floating around Izuku’s head before retreating back into the bare crack that remained of the once open doorway.

 

Ignoring Izuku’s screams, the entity forced him to look at it and snapped, “Wake up!  Wake up and see the world as it is. I will see you again child.”

 

* * *

  
  


Izuku almost cried with relief when he recognized his mother after he opened his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've not written anything in almost 3 years. This is my attempt to get back on the horse.


	2. Wake up

Izuku’s head throbbed, pain radiating from a line that reached all the way from the crown of his head to the nape of his neck.  Opening his eyes took more effort than he could ever remember expending. It felt as though his eyelids were taped down. Izuku managed to preserve long enough to see a white ceiling above him and his mother’s sleeping face out of the corner of his eye before he was dragged back into darkness.  

 

 _Hospital_ , he thought muzzily.

 

Time passed.  In the darkness, Izuku’s mind began to pull itself back together, the gaping hole waiting to be patched over with borrowed memories.

 

* * *

 

Izuku woke in the void alone.  He knew he had been here before, but the details slipped from his grasp.  Still, he was not surprised to see a landmark in the vast whiteness.

 

The closed door stood before him, imposing yet quiescent. This time Izuku noticed the carving that was etched into its face.  A massive torii gate stretched above his head. Instead of normal posts, the pillars that framed the torii gate appeared to have roots stretching down into the stone. He moved closer, trying to make out the details.  Symbols decorating the gate itself teased at Izuku, but he was unable to place them. The closer he looked, the more clouded his mind felt.

 

Rather than continue to approach the approach the door, Izuku turned away.  Instead of the blank whiteness he was expecting, his first nine years stretched out in front of him.  His earliest memories. Every bruise and harsh word. Every teary smile and anxious hug from his mother.  Impressions hung like a fractal tapestry; small images caught Izuku’s attention for a moment, until the entire history coalesced.  

 

Even with all the hurt and difficulty, Izuku’s dream of becoming a hero shined through. That hope softened the rough edges, smoothed away the jagged pain of his memories.

 

The void did not allow him to keep that illusion.

 

Hope was stripped from the picture and Izuku looked at his past without anything coloring his views.  

 

The life he had lived so far was not what he had allowed himself to see.  He had blinded himself to the Truth of his own world.

 

Izuku was being abused by someone he called a friend.  Izuku was not getting support from anyone other than his mother.  Izuku was not taking any concrete action to overcome the obstacles in his path.  

 

He knew that he was missing parts of the picture. Not every moment had been terrible. He knew that he was missing some memories entirely.  But harsh reality was that he also knew that whatever else had happened, those core truths had not changed.

 

Confused, heartbroken, Izuku reached out towards the memories of his past, curling his hands and tearing at the thoughts suspended in the void.  As pieces began to scatter under his nails, Izuku heard a laugh he couldn’t quite recognize.

 

It almost sounded like himself.

 

He woke up.

 

* * *

  


This time, Izuku opened his eyes to his mother’s conscious, worried face.

 

“Mom,” he tried to say.  Only his throat was so dry that barely a sound passed his lips.

 

“Izuku! Oh, I’ve been so worried about you.”  Inko pressed the nurse call button before pulling the visitors chair closer so she could hold his hand, careful not to disturb the IV line.

 

“Your throat sounds dry, don’t try to talk until the nurses let you have some water.”

 

Izuku nodded cautiously.  The movement was a mistake.  Pain seared through his head, and he tried to lift his free hand to probe at the source.  That movement was also a mistake.

 

“No, Izuku stay still.  You didn’t break any bones, but there is a lot of bruising and muscle damage.”

 

The door swung open and a white-coated doctor walked through, followed by a nurse.  The doctor’s expression was one of practiced concern, but at least looked more sincere than the ones Izuku was used to seeing from adults.

 

“Midoriya-kun, it’s good to see you awake,” the doctor’s voice was calm.  While she ran a practiced eye across the various machines surrounding the bed, the nurse approached with a cup filled with ice chips.  

 

“We were worried you would slip into a coma.  Fortunately, you roused early enough that we did not have to intubate you.”

 

An ice chip was lifted to Izuku’s mouth, and he gratefully allowed it to sooth his sore throat.  

 

“Midoriya-kun, can you please tell me how you’re feeling?” the doctor asked.

 

“My head hurts.  I think my shoulder has a burn? It feels like one.”

 

Her lips thinned.  “Yes, there was a second degree burn on your shoulder in addition to your other injuries.”  She clearly wanted to comment further on that point, but refrained after glancing towards his mother’s wan face.  

 

Even though it sent pain through him again, Izuku couldn’t help but yawn.  Lining up his thoughts to answer even the most basic question was exhausting.

 

“Izuku, oh, I’m so sorry,” Inko finally burst out.  Tears welled in her eyes as she met her son’s confused gaze, but the conversation was cut short.

 

“Midoriya-san, I know you want to speak with your son about what happened, but for now we need to focus on his treatment.  If you stay here, I need you to let me finish without interruptions.”

 

Eyes still watering, Inko nodded and tightened her grip on Izuku’s hand.  It hurt, but everything did, so he just squeezed back.

 

The doctor’s questions continued.

 

“Are you feeling any nausea?”

 

“A little bit.”

 

“What about your vision, any dark spots or blurriness?”

 

“No.”

 

“I’m going to test various parts of your legs, please do not look and tell me where the instrument is touching.”

 

After satisfying a seemingly endless barrage of questions and tests, the doctor finally smiled.

 

“Thank you Midoriya-kun.  I know that must have been tiring.  Now that we know more about your condition, we’re going to increase your pain treatment while we continue to monitor your vital signs.  Please try to let yourself sleep when you can. It’s an important part of your treatment.”

 

The nurse adjusted the IV line, and a welcome numbness pulled Izuku towards sleep.  Voices continued around him as he drifted.

  


“Midoriya-san, it appears that your son has a number of burn scars; we’ve been told that your husband has a fire-based quirk?”

 

For a moment Izuku tried to rouse himself, but unconsciousness claimed him again.

 

* * *

  


This time Izuku remembered his bargain.  

 

He placed a hand on the door.  Memories that had been gifted to him drifted through the holes left in his mind from the toll he had paid.

 

The first thing that struck Izuku was the sense of brotherhood.  His golden-eyed, golden-haired protector had been shaped by his relationship with his brother.  Edward and Alphonse were together against the world; brothers through the darkest and lowest times who dragged each other back into the light.

 

It was nothing like Izuku’s relationship with Kacchan.

 

He knew that other memories were slotting into his mind.  They did not matter at the moment.

 

A voice whispered from the void and from his mind, an eerie echo surrounding him.

 

_Humankind cannot obtain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost._

 

For the first time, Izuku began to understand the real cost of his bargain with the Truth.  Three years of memories were entirely lost. The spirit of other memories were destroyed just as thoroughly.  He gained an understanding of brotherhood, and paid for that understanding.

 

As he mourned his false friendship, more information began to seep through:  alchemy, formulae, the very first hints of how to use his new power.

 

Other memories and instinctive knowledge submerged into the depths of his mind, waiting to surface at the right time.

 

Izuku’s hand fell from the door, and he felt himself being pulled out of the void.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all of the comments and kudos- I'm terrible about responding to comments, but I appreciate all of them.


	3. Catharsis

Izuku nervously patted at his hair, avoiding the neatly shaved stripe around the wound that vertically bisected his scalp. He wondered if the hair would grow back thickly enough to cover the inevitable scar.  He tried and failed to avoid thinking about the upcoming meeting.

 

He really wished his mother would be there when the police interviewed him.  Instead, a social worker attached to the hospital would be representing Izuku’s interests and making sure he wasn’t unduly influenced by his mother’s presence.  

 

Not that anyone had told him the second reason of course.  But Izuku had caught the concerned looks from various nurses and doctors.  When he had admitted that he couldn’t remember the last three years the suspicious eyes had fallen on his mother as well.

 

The demands of his body had kept Izuku from defending his mother; he had sworn that he would make sure the police would leave their interview without any doubts about his mother's love for him.

 

But the waiting was hard.

 

Izuku combed his curls away from his forehead and tried to picture how he would look with longer hair.  He had formed a mental image and was trying to imagine how a ponytail would look when he grew up when a knock interrupted his daydream.

 

“Midoriya-kun?” a gentle voice spoke from just outside the door. “May we come in?”

 

“Yes, please, that’s fine.”

 

The social worker he had met earlier was accompanied by a pair of police officers, both formally dressed and sober-faced.  The social worker took over the seat his mother normally occupied and pulled out a set of documents before settling in, clearly prepared to listen.

 

The female police officer smiled carefully at Izuku before offering her hand.  “Hello Midoriya-kun, I am detective Koyanagi Akemi and this is my partner detective Tsukauchi Naomasa.”

 

Izuku nodded in greeting but stayed silent as he shook the offered hand.

 

Accepting his silence, Koyanagi pulled a chair close to Izuku’s bedside.  “Now, Midoriya-kun, we've been told are missing some memories. Is that correct?”   
  


“Yes, Koyanagi -san.  From what we’ve been able to determine, I’m missing the last three years or so,” Izuku agreed.  That had been a set of awkward conversations coupled with the horrifying realization that he was now three years behind on his education, even with his new memories filling in gaps.  Afterall, Edward had never studied Japanese History or Literature, even if his mathematics and physics knowledge were top-notch.   
  


Koyanagi glanced over at her partner where he leaned against the wall, keeping Izuku from being crowded by adults.  At his decisive nod, she sighed before pulling out a notebook and flipping past the first few pages.   
  


“Well,” she said, trying to smile, “that does mean that we won't get all the answers that we would like to have about how you ended up here, Midoriya-kun. But there are still some questions that we have to have answered.”   
  


Izuku tensed, sensing the direction the conversation was going to go.

  
“Specifically, the doctors have noted that you have scarring on your back and arms, most of them appear to be burns.”   
  


Koyanagi waited for a response.   


  
Izuku said nothing.   


  
She sighed, but didn’t look surprised.  She nodded towards the social worker. “We know you’re a smart boy Midoriya-kun, and I think you can guess what these questions are about.  But we have to ask them, and it’s important that you tell us what you can, okay?”

 

Izuku managed to mutter his acceptance.

 

“If it gets to be too much, we can take a break.” Tsukauchi offered unexpectedly.

 

“Right,” Koyanagi continued seamlessly, “we've been told that your father Midoriya Hisashi has a fire breathing quirk, is that correct?”   


  
At least this question Izuku could answer without any hesitation. “That's what I've been told. I actually don't recall meeting my father. He's been working abroad since I was a toddler.”   


  
Koyanagi made a quick note, and Izuku could see her mentally crossing his father off the list of potential causes.

 

“That must be difficult, having your father so far away,” she prompted.

 

Izuku could feel the healing skin on his scalp stretch as he furrowed his brow.  “Not really? I mean, I suppose it’s hard on my mother, but he made his choices.”  Izuku clamped down on any further comments, distantly wondering if he was speaking to his own father or unduly influenced by Edward’s memories of his own absent father.

 

Clearly sensing that line of inquiry did not lead anywhere productive, Koyanagi redirected her questioning. “There are other ways of getting burn scars. Besides quirks,” she offered.

 

Izuku nodded cautiously.

 

“Sometimes accidents happen, particularly in places like kitchens.  With your mom raising you alone, I imagine that it could be hard to keep an eye on you all the time.”

 

He was tempted to agree with her.  To suggest that his own carelessness and clumsiness caused the scars that had brought the police to his bedside.  The clench of the detective’s jaw told him that lying would not end the investigation, and might result in trouble for his mother.

 

“My mother makes sure I don’t hurt myself in the kitchen.  She taught me how to use the stove, and she watches me as well.”

 

“Can you tell us about your relationship with your mother?”

  
  
Izuku could feel his face turning red with anger. “My mother does not hurt me,” he seethed.

 

The social worker stood, placing her arm in front of Izuku as though to shield him. Before she could say anything, Detective Tsukauchi intervened.

 

“We believe you Midoriya-kun.  But do you understand why we’re asking?  We have to ask uncomfortable questions, and by answering them now, you’re helping us clear up any possible misunderstandings.”   
  
  
Koyanagi continued, “Now, some of those burns are more recent. And with memory problems, we know you can't tell us how you were burned. But some of them are at least three years old, particularly one on your right shoulder blade.”

  
  
His hands twitched, but he kept them in his lap instead of tracing where he remembered Bakugou shoving him with a palm full of explosive-powered sparks.   
  


“If those burns were intentional, then it was assault.  And if someone used their quirk, then it was quirk misuse as well.”   
  


Even missing the intervening years, by the age of nine denying Kacchan’s actions was habit. But with the police fully prepared to dig as deep as necessary, Izuku knew he couldn’t keep doing it.   
  
  
  
So he sighed and admitted, “there's a boy my age who I've known for a really long time who occasionally uses his quirk on me.”  Not wanting to hear questions about why he let it happen, Izuku continued, “when I went to my teachers, they either didn't believe me or told me that I shouldn't try to get him in trouble.” Izuku clenched his jaw as his eyes flooded with tears, “I assume that it's been going on for the past three years that I can't remember. There's no reason for him to have changed.” he buried his face in the scratchy hospital sheet tucked around him.

  
  
The social work’s gentle voice asked the next question, “why did the teachers not put a stop to it?”   
  


“Because I don't have a quirk and they think that he is going to be a hero. So I am just a necessary sacrifice on his path.”   
  


The sound of the door opening and then swinging shut startled Izuku into looking up.  The male detective had left the room and Izuku could see him furiously pacing just outside, arms gesturing as his unintelligible mutters barely filtered through the door.

  
  
“Can you tell me the boy's name?” asked Koyanagi.    


  
“I'm not sure I want him to get in trouble. It's...I mean, it's not right that he hurt me or used his quirk… but nobody was telling them to stop and he's my age.  If he gets in trouble, but the teachers who encouraged him don’t get in trouble...It’s just not, it’s not fair to him, is it?”   
  


“Teachers who encouraged him?” the detective repeated tightly.  Then she forced herself back on track. “Well, you're right, that it's not correct. But you said this boy wants to be hero?”

  
“Yeah, yeah, he does want to be a hero.”

 

“And what if he treated people that he was supposed to rescue the way that he treated you?”   
  
“He wouldn't do that.”   
  
“Are you sure?”   
  
Izuku paused, considering; honestly, now, he wasn't sure. If a person wasn't sufficiently grateful, if they weren't cooperative, or if Bakugou got hurt because of someone, how would he react?   
  
What if he rescued someone quirkless? Would he be angry then as well?   
  


Detective Tsukauchi reentered the room while Izuku contemplated.   
  
Reading into the silence, Koyanagi reinforced her point, ”he needs to know  _ now _ that it's not okay. He needs to be taught so he that doesn't become an adult and think it's okay to use his apparently very destructive quirk against other people. Learning it now is important, and apparently no one is teaching him.  Otherwise we would not be here asking these questions.”   
  
  
“I think his quirk would be really good at heroics though.” Izuku admitted,  “If I tell you who it is what's going to happen him?”   
  
Koyanagi paused before offering, “at the very least, any future schools would be made aware of his history so they can keep an eye on him. If you're asking if it will keep him out heroics entirely, not necessarily.  It would depend on his reactions to authority curtailing his activities.” There was also the unspoken truth that a really powerful quirk would smooth the way past youthful troubles. She looked straight at Izuku until he made eye contact before finishing, “But if it does keep him from being a hero, it's because of his own actions. Not because something you said.  There would be nothing to say if you didn’t have scars telling their own story.”   
  
There was silence seem to last forever, punctuated only by Izuku’s unsteady breathing as silent sobs rattled his chest.  The social worker offered him a box of tissues before getting up to wet a washcloth and offering it to the overwhelmed boy.   
  
Izuku scrubbed at his eyes, “I don’t know when it really began, we were friends once I think.”  Though Izuku questioned whether that label had ever really applied, “but once I was diagnosed as quirkless, he began using his quirk on me.  On anyone that he thinks looks down on him or doesn’t respect him.”   
  


“What is his name, Izuku-kun?”

 

“Bakugou Katsuki.  He generates explosions from his sweat.”  

 

It was cathartic to admit it.  To name the author of so much torment. The rest of the interview wasn’t easy by any stretch of the imagination, but the biggest wound had been lanced.  The lack of recent memories limited what Izuku could offer, but the detectives assured him that they would work to make sure that Bakugou was carefully monitored, and that they school was investigated, even if they couldn’t guarantee anything more concrete.   
  


Exhaustion caught up with him and Izuku fell asleep in the middle of an answer about other kids who had been attacked by Bakugou or his cronies.   
  


* * *

 

Later that afternoon his mother came into his hospital room.  She tried to smile: it was clear that her heart wasn't entirely in it.  Izuku wondered how much the detectives had told her. He hoped that they had given her Kacchan’s name at least.  He didn’t want to have that conversation with her.   
  
Inko fussed over Izuku’s hair and bandages. “Looks like we're going to be able to take you home tomorrow.  You're not quite ready for school though.”   
  
Existential dread traced down Izuku’s back at the thought of returning to the school, missing memories and with the adults knowing they were under investigation.  He would probably take another tumble down the stairs.   
  


“I don't want to go back to school. Do you think we could set up some homeschooling system? I need to catch up on three years that I’m missing…” Izuku trailed off before forcing himself to add “and I don't think I'd be safe there.”   
  


Inko closed her eyes.  Tears spilled down her cheeks as she nodded.  Izuku’s admitted fear was hardly the straw that broke the camel’s back.  The preliminary investigation had done that. But it was the first time Izuku had admitted that there was a problem.  The only option she now had was how Inko could help him solve it.

 

“With the way the investigation is going, I’m sure that Aldera Junior High would help arrange that.”  Inko’s voice grew slightly angry as she noted, “if they thought it would prevent a lawsuit, I bet they’d bend over backwards to arrange it.”   
  


Seeing Izuku’s concerned look, Inko set aside her plans to crush the school she had trusted to educate and protect her son.  Afterall, she had a lawyer to help her with that, no need to burden her son.    
  


“So homeschooling is what you want, Izuku?”

 

“I don’t want to see that school again,” he agreed.  “Actually, I don’t want to see anyone involved again at all if I don’t need to.”

 

Inko mentally crossed Katsuki apologizing off her list of demands towards the school.  Well, apologizing to Izuku at least. From what she was hearing, he owed apologies to quite a few children.  No reason why he should be able to avoid those consequences at least.

 

The bigger question was how to keep Izuku away from the Bakugou family when they lived so close, and Katsuki knew where to find her son.   
  


  
Well, she wasn’t particularly attached to that apartment anyway.  Between her savings and the support checks meticulously deposited into their bank account, relocation was an easy solution. 

  
“I won’t make any promises,” Inko started, “but I’ll do my best.  We can stay at an inn for a few weeks while we find a new place to live.  Is there anyone you want to say goodbye to? Or should we just disappear like Gateway?” Something tight in her chest loosened slightly when Izuku smiled at the mention of the teleporting hero.   
  
“When I was nine I would say no, there’s no one I want to talk to. I doubt that has changed. I just...I want to put this behind me.  I want to start something new.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Detective Koyanagi Akemi is an OC. I doubt she'll reappear in future chapters as anything more than a side-note.


	4. The Plan, or it was Real

Izuku knew there was a lot going on in the background that he didn't know about.  For once he was content to not know all the details, and to just let his mother handle everything.  Unlike before, when Inko didn’t know the details of Izuku’s treatment, now she had the information she needed to act.  And Izuku trusted her to take care of things. His injuries would be a weapon for his mother to wield against the world.

 

He didn’t want to watch it.  He would just appreciate the results.

 

It also left him plenty of time to concentrate on what he had learned from his new memories.

 

He didn’t doubt that something had awoken in him.  He didn’t. But until he could actually test the energy he felt crackling under his skin, he wouldn’t be entirely certain.

 

Yet he also had _hope_ for the first time in years.

 

Izuku was almost grateful that he was too closely watched in the hospital to try anything. The last thing he needed was some doctors proclaiming that a major injury had awoken a quirk in him.  That would just be asking for more people to get hurt. Or even let people get away with hurting quirkless people with the excuse of _helping_ them.

 

So he let the energy ebb and crest in his body, focused on trying to understand the complexities of the matter around him and letting himself rest when he wasn’t making notes.  

 

* * *

 

“Are you sure you’re okay taking the train?” Inko asked fretfully as they prepared to leave the hospital. “We could get a taxi, even if it takes longer, at least you won’t get jostled in the crowd.”

 

“It’s fine, mom- with the shaved stripe in my hair I think people will either avoid crowding me because they think I’m a delinquent or they’ll realize I have an injury.”

 

“I suppose that’s true.”

 

They walked out of the hospital in comfortable silence, Inko directing Izuku towards the station. “We’re on the _Ginza_ line the entire time.  The ryokan is really nice- traditional, but comfortable.”

 

“How long do you think we’ll be there?” he asked.

 

Inko pursed her lips in thought.  “Probably only two weeks. The school officials are really worried; they’re quite helpful _now_.”  Izuku could hear the anger underlying the final word.

 

He reached out and caught her hand before squeezing it comfortingly as they entered the station.  

 

Inko squeezed back and sighed.  “Right, right, no reason to dwell on it.  The problem is going to be fixed for future students, and in the meantime we’ll make the best of things.”

 

“And that means taking a mini-vacation and letting them arrange for our move, right mom?”

 

Inko forced a smile and agreed.

 

“Wait, mom, you’re going oversee them packing up my All Might merchandise, right? You’re not going to let a stranger handle my limited edition items without oversight, are you?”

 

In spite of herself, Inko’s smile became real.  “No, Izuku- I’ll take care of the important things myself.  Please trust me on this- I don’t want you going back to the apartment at all.  Your job is to heal.”

 

Izuku nodded, his quiet musing about which items needed special handling filled the air until the train arrived.

 

* * *

 

  
By the end of their first week staying at the inn after Izuku was released from the hospital, he had already filled up an entire notebook with notes, diagrams, and drawings.  Unlike his notebooks filled with quirk analyses, Izuku knew he wouldn’t want to try explaining some of the details and concepts outlined in his new notes. Even in a world of quirks, the idea of gaining memories from someone in an entirely different world would probably see him under a doctor’s care. And that was without getting into the idea that his source of knowledge was via a Gate guarded by a metaphysical embodiment of Truth.

 

Fortunately with knowledge of Edward’s memories came his understanding of an entirely new language.  Izuku didn’t think that anyone would be able to translate Amestrian; the runes and drawings of transmutation circles were odd, but presumably anyone snooping would assume it was part of a code Izuku invented for his notes.

 

Actually, translating his quirk notes would be a good idea as well.  It would let him refresh his memories and hone his insights. Insights which would have been the foundation of any work as a quirkless hero.

 

Edward’s focus on research had shown him that such discernment would help him no matter what his abilities could accomplish.  Understanding an opponent’s skills and tactics would never be useless. Looking at his old notes through new eyes would help him drown out the mockery and derision that still colored his memories of the past.

  
As relaxing as it was to stay at the ryokan while Inko arranged their new apartment and supervised the packing up of their things, Izuku found his mother's constant checking in on him somewhat stifling. He couldn’t approach her with alchemy until he had at least some grasp on what it could actually do.  And without some privacy, he couldn’t test it. Her concern made it impossible for Izuku to seriously contemplate sneaking off on his own. Practicing in the inn was a bad idea: if anything went wrong there was no hiding the result.

 

So Izuku bided his time, made notes, and developed a plan. With everything else feeling like sand under his feet, Izuku went back to his foundational goal.  Become a hero. After all, “Alchemists, be thou for the people…” was a motto that Edward gifted him along with his memories. Being a hero would allow Izuku to live up to that ideal.

 

On a fresh page, Izuku began writing out the basic steps for his Development Plan for Health and Heroics.  
  
**1) Physical Training**

Katsuki had interfered with Izuku’s past attempts to train himself or enroll in self defense courses.  Any attempt to improve himself had been slapped down verbally by the other boy, usually enforced with physical intimidation.

 

Izuku could feel the bitter smile stretch across his face.  Katsuki had called it “just another reminder that he was never to try and rise above his status.”  The other boy had told Izuku that he was worthless because he couldn’t protect himself, and then actively prevented Izuku from developing the necessary skills to do so.

He shook off the dark thoughts and reminded himself that Bakugou was in the past, and he needed to focus on the future.  He would need an outsider’s help eventually, but to start with he could adopt the training Edward and Alphonse had been though under Izumi Curtis.  

 

A shiver went down Izuku’s back at the thought of the female alchemist.  He knew that if he tried to follow her training and slacked off, somehow, some way, through time and reality itself, she would make him pay for it.

 

‘Okay, that one was definitely Edward’s memories influencing me.’  
  
So, develop strength, stamina, and flexibility now, worry about refining it later.

 

**2) Academics**

  
Even though his teachers had never protected him, they at least had never complained about Izuku’s intelligence, just his goals.  Even Katsuki focused on his lack of a quirk. Because of the Gate’s toll, he was three years behind in a lot of classes, but there were some excellent options for online classes.

 

When mutation quirks began manifesting in earnest, it had become clear that not every individual was well adapted physically to their own powers, not to mention those whose quirks were by nature hazardous to other people.  Japan had reacted by developing extensive online courses, determined to educate those who would otherwise be isolated from society.

 

It was one of the most successful efforts to reduce villainy ever made.  Izuku wished that a similarly robust effort was made for quirkless people.  

 

Still, with his previous school’s support, he’d be able to access those courses.  Even if he was three years behind, no one would be controlling the speed at which he finished courses, nor prevent him from testing out of math and sciences that Edward’s memories allowed him to master.  If he wanted to enter UA, stellar grades and acing the written admission test would help him secure a place in at least the general course.

 

**3) Alchemy**

  
Izuku refrained from expanding even mentally on this step.  Until he tested his knowledge in the real world, he didn’t want to make any firm plans.  At the same time, he couldn’t bear to leave it off his list entirely. He had to have some faith that he had gained something real in trade for his memories and naivaté.  

 

 _Equivalent Exchange_ .

 **4) Actually talk with his mother**  
  
This one was hard, Izuku knew that she was already terribly worried for him, especially with his missing memories.  Unfortunately, Edward’s memories didn’t provide any guidance. He had lost his mother when he was five.

 

After hiding so much from his mother for so long, and seeing both her grief and her resolve, Izuku owed her some peace of mind.  He just needed to get to the point where he could demonstrate alchemy, explain that it had unlocked following his injury, and have her help him registered as a quirk.  That would theoretically demonstrate that he was not going to hide things from her again, and show her that he still had plans for the future, that his painful experiences hadn’t ruined him. Hopefully that would ease some of her worries.

  
  
**5)** **Friends**   
  
Izuku underlined this step in his notebook. He knew that he needed to make friends, that he couldn't spend the next few years only interacting with his mother.

Unlike the other steps, he wasn’t sure how to pursue this goal.   Obviously previous classmates were out. Honestly, so was learning from past experiences. He was pretty sure he didn't actually have any previous friendships.  
  
And he was moving to a new location and not enrolling in school there.  
  
Perhaps when he was moving into their new place, he’d be able to meet some neighbors, even if they weren’t his own age.  
  
He wouldn't pin any hopes on reaching this goal.  But he’d try, if only to make sure his ability to speak with non-family members didn’t atrophy.

  
  
**6) Backup plans**

 

He had always been aiming for UA.  Izuku knew that he had high aspirations.  But he also knew that he had pinned so many hopes on that future without developing any real backup plans.  And that wasn't the right choice for him- multiple routes and strategies always made him feel better.  
  
So if he got into the heroics course, that would be ideal.  But if he didn’t, what were the other options?  
  
Obviously there were other schools with hero courses and he needed to look into applying to those programs as well.

There were also alternatives such as apprenticeships that could lead to hero licenses, but those were mostly reserved for specialties like healing quirks that could be used in emergencies.  He would have to explore which specialties provided paths that he could qualify for. Perhaps information gathering or analysis?  
  
Next, what if he got into UA but not the hero course.  With his knowledge of science of math, he might be able to make the support course.  Though, Izuku would have to do a lot of work and demonstrate skills in engineering in order to do that. So he shouldn't count on that either.

He hadn’t looked too closely at the entrance requirements for support students, but given the quality of items on display during the Sports Festival, they probably came in with a high degree of skill. So, something to think about but not count on.  
  
But the general course. Izuku was reasonably confident that if he kept his grades high enough and did well in the entrance exam he could enter the general course at UA.

Not ideal, but it was a school that was almost entirely staffed by pro heroes, which meant that even if he never entered the hero course, he might make the connections necessary to gain an apprenticeship or some other connection to a hero agency.  Again, not ideal, but still more of a thought out plan than he had had before.  
  
Finally, Izuku forced himself to consider to possibility of not gaining any sort of education that would lead to a heroics license.  

How would he be able to help people?  Back when he was forced to accept that he was quirkless, Izuku had spent some time trying to consider this question.  The laws against vigilantism were focused almost exclusively on unauthorized quirk usage. Right now, Izuku was registered as quirkless.  

Maybe he should wait on getting anything registered until he figured out the scope of what he had gained from the Gate.  If his control turned out to be sufficient to keep any use really subtle...

 

Izuku forced himself off that train of thought.  He would wait until he had actual, real proof in front of his eyes before unpacking that entire Pandora’s Box of issues.

 

So.  Six main goals.  He could do that.  And until they moved into their new apartment, Izuku could begin researching fitness plans appropriate for his goals and which academic courses he could sign up for.  One step at a time, making sure his mom could see that he was still moving forwards.

 

* * *

 

  
Their new apartment was actually in a decent area of Musutafu.  Mostly filled with older residents due to the fact that the closest school was quite some distance away.  Few kids around his own age put a bit of a damper on Izuku’s goal to make friends. Of course, those plans been fairly nebulous.  He would just have to keep his eyes open and try to take advantage of any opportunity to meet people he found.

 

Among the best features were that the area was quiet, safe, and close to quite a few different places where he could exercise and where Izuku could get some privacy.  After two and a half weeks of being in each others’ pockets, Inko was prepared to give her son some space.

She had used up all of her vacation time during Izuku’s hospitalization and move from their apartment. Her bosses were supportive, but deadlines were deadlines and they couldn’t afford for her to take any more time off.  
  
The morning after they had moved into their new apartment, Inko suggested that Izuku spend some time setting up his room and maybe looking at the course catalog now that he was officially enrolled in the online program.  

 

She left after brushing his bangs back away from his face, and reminding him that “you can call my cell phone or the office if necessary.” She walked out the door, calling back to Izuku, “if you leave the apartment, make sure you leave a note.  There’s food in the refrigerator, I’ll see you tonight!”

 

Immediately, Izuku went to his alchemy notebook and pulled out the transmutation circle he had decided to use for his initial test.

 

It was a simple transmutation, very similar to one of the first ones Edward had mastered. In Edward’s case, he had taken a chunk of firewood and reshaped it into a small armored figure.

 

Izuku planned to take old newspapers he had collected and reshape them into a wooden figure.

 

Just as he finished collecting the stack of newspaper, he realized that he had already made a mistake.  

 

Turning paper into wood was a straightforward transmutation.

 

But newspaper also had ink. By not accounting for that element, he would be setting himself up for backlash, as there would be no place in his new creation for the unexpected raw material.  The knowledge and memories he had gained from the Gate would probably have allowed Izuku to adapt to the problem.

 

That wasn’t the point.  

 

This was supposed to be a proof of concept that he could demonstrate to his mother without any stumbling blocks.  He needed to learn to see the details like that before he made plans. Fortunately, rather than try to recalculate his array, basic though it was, Izuku had an easy substitute for the newspaper.

 

His mother wouldn’t be thrilled that he used up the ream of printer paper she had tucked away.  If this worked out, she’d surely forgive the use. And if it didn’t work out. No, Izuku refused to think about that possibility.

  
He would take the ream of paper, understand the structure of the material, decompose it, and then reconstruct it in a form that consumed the building blocks the paper supplied. There was not another option.  The energy he had been feeling for weeks practically begged to be used by this point.  
  
Izuku eyed the kitchen counter thoughtfully, before realizing that performing the transmutation of paper into wood on top of a wood table might test his control in a way he wasn’t ready for.

 

Instead, he took out a pencil and sat on the kitchen floor, tracing out his calculated circle against the linoleum.  Each symbol was checked against both his memories and his notes until he was certain it was perfect.

 

He weighed the ream of paper on the kitchen scale to double check, and then placed it neatly in the center.

 

It was the moment of truth. If he called up that energy, reached out to touch the circle and nothing happened…

  
Izuku forcefully ignored that possibility, caught hold of the power flowing under his skin, and pushed it forward into the lines he had drawn.    
  
Blue power crackled around him. And, in a flash, the paper had reshaped itself into a dense wooden sculpture.  
  
Originally he had planned on making  something new to fit into his All Might collection.  Yet when he actually visualized what he wanted to create, a different image filled his mind.

 

In the center of the marked up floor sat a carefully crafted figure of a young man.  The right arm and left leg were detailed, articulated armor. The hair was tied back.  A long coat was thrown over one shoulder, swirling around the body of the figure as a fierce expression looked into the distance.

It was perfect.  Edward Elric standing tall and defiant was perfect for Izuku’s first attempt to use alchemy.  The figure was the only witness as Izuku began to cry. A mixture of fear and relief and hope for a future that he had almost given up on.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this universe, Amestrian is not analogous to English or German. In Izuku's world, trying to translate it would be equivalent to translating an orphan language that was interspersed with mathematical and alchemical symbols.


	5. Displacement at Home

After his successful experiment, Izuku tried to calm down and spend time reviewing courses as his mother had suggested.  The elation coursing through him kept him far too wound up to concentrate. Yet the success of using _alchemy_ in his world highlighted the sense of displacement he had been feeling since he woke up in the hospital. Even when Izuku sat at the keyboard he had used for years, trying to type felt strangely foreign. His fingers splayed across the keys awkwardly, and Izuku itched to pull out a notebook to take notes instead.  He wondered if he could get bound textbooks to use for courses instead of reading online.

 

Giving up on looking at the courses, Izuku instead decided to prepare everything for his alchemy demonstration for his mother. He had already decided that a variation of his first transmutation would be a good choice. It was impressive, but not so flashy that she would immediately insist on having the quirk registered.  

  
He thought about demonstrating it without a circle. He could feel the ability flowing from where his experiences with the Gate perched in his mind.

 

But again, he elected to err on the side of caution. He would use a circle to show his mother.  Once he was outside and away from anything or anyone else that could be harmed by backlash or accidentally set on fire he would try alchemy using only the access provided by the Gate.

 

Truthfully, Izuku was slightly worried about trying transmutation without a circle.  He _knew_ he had the ability.  But he also knew that the price he paid to access the Gate was relatively low.  Izuku had taken a different path to meet Truth than Edward and Alphonse, indeed, he had not wound up at the Gate via transmutation at all.  Yet his visit left him with power while he still walked away on his own two legs.

 

What if trying to use transmutation without a circle brought him before the Gate and it demanded a higher price?

 

Yet deep inside, he felt a foreign spark had already been lit.  Whatever had else might happen in the future, Izuku knew that the Gate had already rooted itself into his soul.

 

* * *

 

  
Looking up newspaper ink composition, Izuku was relieved to learn that the vast majority of them were soy based, and thus easy to incorporate into his planned transmutation.  After double-checking the circle and the materials, the rest of the day stretched before him empty of plans.

 

Izuku shook himself out of the brief funk and forced himself to check his mapped out strategy.  

 

Physical training was out because he wanted to to let his mother know where he was going before exploring the area around their new home; it would be terrible for her to come home to an empty apartment on her first day back to work.  

 

Izuku had tried working on his academics; maybe if he calmed down he would go back to this step.  He had already worked on both alchemy and actually talking with his mother, so those two were taken care of.

 

Friends...he wasn’t quite ready to work on that.  At the very least, most other kids were probably still in school right now.

 

Which left his final objective, backup plans.  Izuku decided to pull out his hero analysis books.  No matter what happened, refining his ability to dissect quirks would support his goals.  Not to mention, with three years of memories missing, there would have been all sorts of hero debuts and fights that Izuku knew nothing about and could now enjoy relearning.

 

After grabbing his most recent notebook, Izuku’s plan was kiboshed almost immediately.  Interspersed throughout the notes were kanji that he didn’t recognize. Presumably ones that were taught during his missing grade levels. Izuku knew he made a point of using new kanji as much as possible in order to cement them in his mind. Trying to interpret using the hiragana, katakana, and kanji he _did_ know was only partially successful.  Any time Izuku began to get into the flow of the analysis, he would be caught off guard by something unfamiliar; if not the kanji throwing him off, then it was his notes cross-referencing fights he didn’t remember and using shorthand comments to connect to heroes he had never seen.

 

It was so disorienting to see his own handwriting, his own analysis, and not be able to immediately follow it, that Izuku decided that he would start with his oldest notebooks and work forwards. As he pulled out the first volume, Izuku tried to use the familiar sight to dispel his sense of displacement.  

 

Reviewing his earliest, simplistic, notes, Izuku had the sinking realization that other than All Might, his first real analysis was of Katsuki’s quirk. His hands trembled slightly as he traced the colorful explosions drawn under childish handwriting.  He could almost taste the excitement he had felt the first time he witnessed Kacchan using his power. Izuku resolved to ignore the notes for now. Izuku was trying to stop being emotionally invested in that masquerade of friendship. There was no reason to dive right back into the memories and wallow in the saudade.

 

Maybe later he would review those notes, once he could be detached from the situation and simply see it as information he might need in the future, should they wind up in school together again.

  
Now, he would let himself focus on his favorites. So he started, of course, with All Might.  Izuku was glad that he had managed to cross index major heroes across his various notebooks. The sheer amount of information he had compiled about All Might was slightly embarrassing.  Everything from major fights, costume changes, tactics, and sightings across Japan were carefully noted. More abstractly, Izuku enjoyed rereading his own speculations on All Might’s quirk; the exact nature of the quirk was the subject of uncountable online posts and debates.  Careful parsing of his partially unintelligible later notes also revealed a decreasing active presence for the hero. Slightly fewer heroic acts, but distinctly fewer sightings among the public. Not enough for All Might to fall from Number 1, but noticeable when tabulating years of (slightly) obsessive data.

  
Simply compiling all of his notes about All Might took a surprising amount of time; after a quick check to confirm that Endeavor was still ranked Number 2, Izuku realized he would only begin to outline his collective notes before his mother arrived home.  Still, he put some effort into profiling the Flame hero while he waited.

* * *

 

 

“Tadaima,” Inko called out cheerfully as she entered the apartment.  “I stopped by the store, I thought we’d have your favorite.”

 

Izuku barely made it to the kitchen before his mother, calling out “Okaeri!” as he dashed from his room.

 

“Izuku...what’s this?” Inko asked blankly, looking at the complex diagram drawn on the floor and the pile of newspaper inside it. She carefully dropped the bags of groceries on the floor as she bent down to look more closely; Izuku’s hand caught hers before she could touch the edges.

  
Izuku flailed as he tried to remember the lines he had written to explain. Frustrated at his own inability, he finally blurted out, “Mom, it’s something I need to show you.  It’s going to be weird, but it’s important.”

 

“Okay, honey, if it’s important.” There was worry in her voice, even as she agreed.  She reached out to her son and ran her hand through his hair, barely skimming over the fuzz that had begun growing over his new scars.

  
While he had prepared a full explanation, Izuku realized that seeing was believing.  And he’d rather demonstrate than have his mother spend any time worried that he had become delusional following the head injury. 

“Watch,” he whispered.

 

Izuku had considered making All Might, but as with his first attempt, he decided against it.  With the various odd technologies available, he wanted to make sure his mother didn’t spend any time thinking he had simply purchased a complex transformation figurine.

 

Blue energy crackled around the circle.  The piled of newspaper shifted, reformed, and then a small wooden figure sat on the floor, unmoving, with no sign that it had ever been anything but wood.  Izuku plucked it from the floor and handed it to his mother. Carefully formed, with no visible flaw, Inko marveled at her own duplicate.

 

Inko was speechless as Izuku went to dampen a cloth to clean the floor. She sat down automatically when he pushed her gently to a chair.

 

“What, what was that?” she finally asked, not looking up from the figurine she cradled between her hands.

  
“I had a dream while I was unconscious,” Izuku responded, carefully measuring out the truths that would be believable.  “When I woke up, I could feel this energy moving through me, and I’ve been spending the last few weeks figuring out how to harness it.”

  
Tears welled up in Inko’s eyes as she dragged her son off the ground and into a hug; Izuku nearly pulled her down to the floor with him as he flailed, trying to keep the cleaning cloth from hitting his mother.  Only her quirk managed to keep them upright. “Oh Izuku, your quirk, it came in! I’m so happy for you.”

  
  
Izuku hid his face in his mother’s shoulder, “I’m not sure exactly how it activated, and I still need to figure some parts out, but I wanted to show you as soon as I could. I didn’t want you to worry any more than you already are.”

  
Releasing Izuku from her hold, Inko wiped her tears away.  “I’ll make an appointment so we can get this registered right away.  I’ll have to clear it with the office, but for news like this, I’m sure they’d be thrilled to let me take an early day tomorrow.”

  
That plan needed to be nipped in the bud. “No, mom. I want...I want to wait a bit before we register it.” 

“Why? You’ve been waiting for so long, don’t you want to make it official?”

 

“Well, first I want to know more about what I can do- I don’t want to be stuck in a doctor’s office while they run me through tests...and, I really don’t want anyone to think that my injury caused my quirk to activate.”

  
  
Inko’s brows knitted in frown as she considered his second point. Reluctantly, she nodded.  “You’re right-I don't want the school to cite this as a reason to get out of what they're facing.” 

Inko began putting the groceries away while she worked through the options out loud.  “If we wait six months or so, that will give you time to work out what you can do, and it’s far enough away from your head injury that they shouldn’t connect the two.  We’ll need to figure an explanation for why it activated,” she warned.

 

Izuku’s shoulders slumped in relief at the concession.  “From what I’ve figured out so far, I need to understand the structure of what I’m transmuting.  I thought I’d focus on taking some chemistry and physics courses, which would help explain why I could access the alchemy now, when I couldn’t before.”

 

“Alchemy?”

 

“Well, that’s what it is, really.  The transformation of matter.”

 

Inko continued thoughtfully,  “we’ll have to decide if that’s the name you want for the quirk registration though, it might cause some problems if the government thinks you’re going to be changing lead into gold.  But that’s something to think about later. Actually, the explanation that your new educational pursuits allowed you to access your quirk would help if Aldera tries to renege on their new standards.”

 

“New standards?”  Izuku asked from where he had sat down at the kitchen table, trying to stay out of his mother’s way.  

 

“There are going to be strict guidelines and outside monitoring for bullying and abuse.  If they object, in addition to your injuries, we can point to your development of a quirk as evidence that their educational standards were subpar in more than one way.”  Inko’s smile wasn’t happy. “Actually, do you want to hear about what’s happening at your old school? I was under the impression that you wanted a break from thinking about it.”

  
Did he?  Izuku knew that part of him should.  It was _his life_ after all- he should want some resolution for the suffering he had endured...yet…

 

Everything, simply everything from Edward’s memories felt far more pressing.  Al still didn’t have a body, and leads were limited...and Izuku’s thoughts screeched to a halt.  Izuku stared blankly at the table. His hands pressed into the wood both did and didn’t look right.  He was Izuku and had flesh hands that matched, yet he remembered the feel of his limbs being torn away and the pain of auto-mail attaching to his nerves. But those memories didn’t change the hands pressed to the wood.

 

 _Edward’s memories felt far more pressing than his own,_ yet he would never know what happened.  

 

Everything Edward had worked towards and suffered for.  From Colonel Mustang’s insufferable behavior yet noble ambitions, to Alphonse’s soul link to the armor degrading over time, to the search for the Philosopher’s Stone.

  
He would never know. Edward’s unresolved desperation to save his brother would curl with the golden-eyed alchemist’s regret inside Izuku’s mind for the rest of his life.  The realization felt like a fist reaching into his chest and clenching around his heart.

  
“I don't think I'm ready to hear,” he told his mom quietly.  It might be good to have some resolution for his own issues, yet Izuku couldn’t help feeling alienated from his own past.

  
Inko nodded as she pulled out the pans to start cooking, easily accepting his demurral.  “Why don't you do to help me cook and tell me about your day?” Izuku was grateful for the distraction and together they put together their evening meal.

 

The katsudon tasted good after the bland hospital food and the tasty but unfamiliar meals from the inn. It felt like he hadn’t eaten katsudon for years. Izuku wasn’t sure it was his favorite food anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you everyone for the comments. As I've mentioned before, I have a hard time responding- please take my word that every single kudos and response means a great deal to me. In particular, thank you to Ashh- you may be a stranger on the internet, but I found your comment super encouraging. In general I find concrit dispiriting, so I'm grateful so many readers pointed out parts they enjoyed or ideas that they hope to see in the future. 
> 
> Not going to include it, but I considered having the extra joint from Izuku's toes be taken by the gate as an invisible toll, mostly because that concept amused me.


	6. Saudade

 

  
The next day Izuku walked around their new neighborhood trying to figure out a good place to test his abilities.  Ideally, it would be private, isolated, and with a variety of materials to transmute.

The first place Izuku found was a warehouse that had clearly been a casualty in a villain's attack. Access had been easily obtained via the back door- the lock had been broken at some point without any attempt made to replace it.  Poorly boarded up windows and the partially torn up floor indicated the building wasn’t being used; fortunately, the overall structure was stable. Broken crates, shattered glass, and various other detritus littered the floor.

Izuku had practiced both paper to wood transformations and wood to wood reconfigurations at length. The debris he could see around him was a good chance to try using circleless alchemy for the first time.  Lightly sweeping some of the dust away from a sheltered corner, Izuku sat and focused on immersing himself in Edward’s memories of transmutations.

Once Izuku felt he had captured the essence of how circleless transmutations felt, he strode over to one of the broken crates and dragged it to an area in which the concrete floor was uncracked.  Eyeing the crate thoughtfully, he carefully collected various scraps of wood that had been scattered around the building until he had sufficient wood for his project.

Breathing in through his nose, Izuku focused, concentrating on visualizing exactly what he wanted to happen and on how.  The bonds that would break and reform. Decomposition and reformation.

He clapped...

and...

Izuku _was_ the circle.

It was almost alarming how different the power felt; instead of having the circle expressed external to him, Izuku felt every part of the transmutation. He realized that all the details that had been taken care of by the calculations inscribed in the circle were flowing through him using the Gate. Izuku felt the power and knew it was his. As the wood reformed itself, Izuku lost himself in the sensation.

When the power had finished flowing through him, Izuku forced himself to open his eyes.  A sturdy table and chair sat in front of him, ready to accommodate Izuku’s note taking as he tested his power.

Excitedly, Izuku turned to celebrate with a person that wasn’t there.

He had spent so much time immersed in Edward’s memory while preparing that he had absorbed Edward’s sense of constant companionship.  Alphonse had been thrilled to share successes with his brother.

Now, there was no one there with Izuku.

Maybe in another life, Izuku would have turned and been able to share the excitement with Kacchan. But again, that false sense of companionship had been excised and emptiness loomed.

The loneliness was crushing.  The one benefit of being alone in the ruined warehouse was that no one could see Izuku cry.  Tears cut tracks through the dust that had settled on his cheeks while he piled together the wood debris.  The gritty texture of the grime scraped across his cheeks as he furiously rubbed the tears away.

Giving up on cleaning his face, Izuku walked around the building, clapping and reshaping the wood pieces he encountered.  Tugging on his memories, he proceeded to reform the broken glass into the window panes, leaving the boards up for the moment. Cracks in the concrete foundation were smoothed into nonexistence as his tears slowly faded. When Izuku finally sagged against the nearest wall, his legs were barely able to keep him upright.  He felt more accomplished and more empty than he could have ever imagined.

Over the next few months, Izuku combined his physical training with his alchemy practice by learning how to free run and using that time to scout out derelict warehouses and abandoned storefronts.  

Every location he repaired, he felt vindicated, that his goal was within reach.  He also had moments of terrible isolation, wanting to share the achievement with someone.  He knew he should use this as inspiration to go forward with his goal of making friends. He didn't.  Izuku wasn’t quite ready to let go of his ghosts, both those from his own memories and those left by Edward’s.

Instead, he increased the number of locations he repaired, desiring and dreading the paired feelings of accomplishment and loneliness. The deserted sites allowed him to practice the size of his transmutations while he limited himself to the materials he felt comfortable with, wood, glass, concrete and common metals.  

Metals were his main stumbling blocks.  In particular, the metal alloys he encountered were _just_ different enough from the ones Edward had encountered that his transmutations were not functioning as well as they should.  Izuku’s ability to decompose the metals was going to remain inefficient until he understood them better, and he found himself recreating the combinations Edward had used, rather than the alloys he actually encountered.

The only remedy beyond practice was research: Izuku had to get a better grip on modern metallurgy and chemistry if he wanted his work to fit in seamlessly with the surroundings.

Unfortunately, Izuku could only fit personal alchemy research in between his formal studies.  To his dismay, though Edward’s memories had provided him with advanced understanding in chemistry, physics, and math, the notations Edward had used for all three were completely different than those used in Japan.  While Izuku understood the abstract and broad concepts that most of his fellow students would struggle to grasp, he needed to relearn an entirely different notation system to prove his competency.

Advanced math and sciences combined with catching up on English, kanji, Japanese literature, and modern history, left Izuku with a very full course schedule. In spite of the incredible amounts of work, he progressed rapidly; he was used to spending most of the day sick with nerves that somebody would attack him, or having to rewrite homework that was stolen using books that had been partially destroyed.  Ironically, even without the boost from Edward’s memories, simply removing him from his previous environment would have been enough to accelerate Izuku’s education. Once he had a grip on chemical notations and mathematical formulae, Izuku tested out of nearly every chemistry and math course available.

Within months Izuku had gained enough understanding of metallic bonding that he felt confident in recreating both solid solutions and interstitial compounds; he was less confident in creating interstitial intermetallic compounds but thought that practical experience would resolve that uncertainty.

Just as he was preparing to return to the various locations he had previously visited, a conversation with his mother forced him to change his plans.

 

* * *

 

“Izuku, I’ve been hearing some interesting rumors at work.”  Inko looked Izuku directly in the eyes across the dinner table, making sure he was paying attention.

“Oh?” he asked cautiously.

“It seems as though _someone_ is cleaning up buildings that have been damaged and then abandoned.  In fact, they’re doing it so quietly that no one has noticed workers or materials coming in or anyone removing trash.  Warehouses that had been declared total loses are usable again.” She said this as though Izuku had not been sharing his activities with her since the beginning.

“That good, though, right?” he asked, playing along.

“I certainly think so...it’s very civic minded for someone to help clean up the consequences of villain attacks...the problem is that _somebody_ is using their quirk to do it,” Inko paused meaningfully.  “Since the building owners didn’t approve the work, it would be considered quirk misuse.  And you know that there are always concerns about public quirk use eventually leading to things like vigilantism. So the punishments can be steep.”

“So you think that police and heroes might start keeping an eye for somebody using their quirk in areas like that.”

“I think that's exactly what's going to happen,” she agreed as she stood up to clear the table.  “It would be even worse if they caught someone using a quirk that wasn’t even registered.”

Izuku slumped slightly, he had known this was coming.  Open communication with his mother meant that the scope of his alchemy was simply too large for her to be comfortable hiding it.  

It wasn’t hard to take the hint, and Izuku agreed to register his quirk five months after he was attacked at school.

The quirk counselor attached to the registration office had been very impressed with Izuku’s alchemy, formally dubbed **Transmutation** in the registry.  The boy demonstrated his alchemy on small hunks of pure metals and glass that he had brought with him for that express purpose.

Fortunately, the explanation for the late manifestation was accepted, particularly once the counselor heard which school had been involved.  The sweeping changes to the entire school district had been kept fairly quiet, but both quirk counselors and doctors associated with the registration office were a part of the systematic monitoring that had been implemented.  
It had taken months to finalize all the reforms, and a full four months before Izuku was prepared to discuss them with his mother.

One of the first things that had changed was more aggressive monitoring of quirk use in general at the school; potentially harmful quirk uses directed at another person were to be automatically reported to the police, regardless of a student’s age.  An increase in cameras and video monitoring equipment provided corroboration for students like Izuku who might have to report incidents themselves. Though, this would hopefully be mitigated with the new ruling that a teacher’s failure to report such a use was now a fireable offense. Granted, the police would almost never legally pursue such incidents by younger students.  Yet simply creating the records of the quirk misuse and providing opportunities to correct behavior starting at a young age meant that people like Katsuki wouldn’t be able to get away with abusing other students while teachers either looked the other way or encouraged the abuse. Such a pattern would be quickly revealed.

In addition to the new rules, nearly every teacher was required to complete re-training certifications, while several were fired outright.

While no individual student was deemed responsible for Izuku’s injuries, it was found that at least a small group had participated.  Without strong evidence pointing at one student in particular, the police were unable to provide the justice Inko wanted for her son.  So she did what she could to protect other students like Izuku, and demanded consequences beyond those applied to the teachers. Caving to her demands, gangs of students who had been found abusing other students had been separated.  All such students were marked for careful monitoring and in some cases counseling. Izuku wasn’t sure how that would apply to Katsuki. Thinking back to his older memories, Izuku wasn’t sure Katsuki really _had_ friends, so would not really care about being separated from them.  Though, maybe removing the minions he gathered around him to constantly praise and support his actions would help curb Katsuki’s behavior.  Izuku could only hope that counseling would lead to anger management for the blond.

Unfortunately, his mother could not tell Izuku exactly what happened to Katsuki specifically.  Apparently, his quirk was powerful and flashy enough that the Hero Public Safety Commission had declined to ban him from obtaining a Hero License outright.  The damage that Izuku could testify to had happened when they were young enough that the commission didn’t consider Katsuki irredeemable.

Other than confirming that apologies were offered to children who had suffered under Katsuki’s aggression, Izuku and Inko were only told that he would be monitored closely throughout his education and subject to strict oversight even if should he obtain his Hero License.  The only other reassurance that they gained was that off the record, Katsuki had been told that if used his quirk aggressively against another student, even once, he would be blacklisted from the best hero courses, even if he could still theoretically gain a Hero License.

It wasn’t perfect.  It wasn’t even justice. It was enough though, since it allowed Izuku to finally put the situation behind him, confident that even if he had scars, there were safeguards in place for other kids.  It was enough that it allowed Izuku to figure out how he would deal with potentially meeting Katsuki in the future. Quite simply, Izuku would act as though he was a stranger. Really, Katsuki was a completely different person than the Kacchan of Izuku’s toddlerhood.  So it wouldn’t even be much of a stretch.

Part of that calculus was based on Izuku’s vindictive understanding of Katsuki.  The blond wanted attention, acknowledgment. Izuku would deny him both should they meet again.  In fact, an apparent lack of recognition would infuriate the other boy. Poetic justice since the injuries Katsuki had caused indirectly produced Izuku’s amnesia, at least as far as the outside world was aware.

 

* * *

 

Following the quirk registration, Izuku began looking for new places to train.  He needed to maintain his physical regime, so a place he could run to and through would be nice, especially if there was a chance to do strength training as well.  

Wanting to reassure his mother that he had caught her hint, Izuku decided to ask her advice.

“A training location? Well, I can think of a few places that are basically abandoned, but you’re going to need to figure out how to avoid public quirk use citations.” Inko’s eyes sparkled, “I’ll give you a hint- there’s a beach that’s technically public but no one goes to it since it’s covered with trash you could use your alchemy on.”

“Covered in trash?” he repeated as he tried to tie his hair back.  The scar was so obvious through shorter hair that he had immediately decided to try growing it out. It wasn’t quite long enough yet to make a ponytail.

“Yes, one of our neighbors was bemoaning it the other day- everything from old dishwashers to rusted out engines.  A lot of raw materials, but it’s out in the open.” Inko batted his hands away and began pulling the top half of his hair back, securing it with a tie.  The rest curled up around the nape of his neck.

“And you think I could practice there without getting into trouble?” his voice dripped skepticism.  He tilted his head, deciding that he could tolerate the feel of the current hairstyle.

“Well, I think that if you do your research and take the right steps you can practice there without breaking any laws,” Inko smiled mischievously when Izuku twisted to look at her.

Izuku was so glad he had reconnected with his mother.  He hadn’t thought about looking for loopholes beyond those he had already found in the vigilante laws.

 

* * *

 

Looking at the quirk laws through the lens provided by Edward Elric’s memories sent a frisson of unease through Izuku. Quirks had been integrated into society so unevenly that it only highlighted the differences between people.  Many mutations were impossible to hide, so allowances were made for the public display of those quirks. Which then isolated those individuals from others whose quirks couldn’t be seen.

Perhaps in the beginning quirk laws had helped; these days Izuku thought there should be guidelines for the use of quirks that were disruptive or destructive, rather than erring on the side of forbidding the use of quirks altogether.  If someone could levitate, why shouldn’t they be encouraged to use that quirk so long as it didn’t harm someone else? If someone had super strength, why did they have to pretend they couldn’t lift heavy loads by themselves?

Izuku thought that only being raised with the assumption that public use was banned made the reality acceptable.  Then again, that’s why Izuku wanted to get a Hero License. So he could use his alchemy to help people without having to pretend that he didn’t have the ability.

  
But clearly, his mom wasn’t alluding to a Hero License if she thought he could use the beach to train now.  So when and where else could quirks be used?

The privacy of one’s home was obvious. The second main place was in professional settings when someone received certification for specific use- such as doctors using diagnostic quirks in clinical settings.

Neither of those two options matched Izuku’s current predicament.

So...how to make the public beach not public, and thus an acceptable place to use a quirk?

Izuku could feel the smile growing as he worked out his mother’s idea.  “Mom, do you know how much public area rentals cost?”

 

* * *

 

  
The permit office was incredulous when Izuku announced that he wanted a permit for Dagobah beach of all places.

“You know that Dagobah Municipal Beach Park is basically unusable, right kid?”

A curl of irritation lit in Izuku’s gut at the dismissive way the officer used the word ‘kid.’ He shoved it down and forced himself to answer, “I know it’s usable for my purposes.  I just need a permit for a private event at the beach that includes permission to set up a tent.”

Clearly deciding not to argue, the man noted, “two-day permits are available for most beaches.  For ones like Dagobah that are listed as chronically under-utilized, seasonal permits are available,” he gestured at the price listings in front of Izuku.

Inko had done her research because Izuku had just enough to cover the seasonal rental.  Shaking his head in disbelief, the clerk accepted the money and passed over the stamped official permit for Izuku to post.

 

* * *

 

A bit of research and practice meant the day after receiving the permit, Izuku walked to the beach, a large tent folded up in his arms. The tent itself was technically made from old sheets that had been strengthened with wood fibers, not that it was possible to tell from just looking at it.  And once it was set up, it would look like a normal, if large, pavilion-style tent that would conceal everything within. If he timed it right, he could use alchemy to set up the tent using materials from the beach as impromptu tent poles woven into the fabric itself. He really didn’t want to struggle with setting everything up by hand, so he had intentionally left home before sunrise in the morning.  

That first morning, one man’s irrepressible curiosity and a penchant for sticking his nose into other people’s business led to Izuku making his first step towards his previously ignored goal.

Friends.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was originally part of Chapter 5, but it wound up being longer than I expected. So bonus- early chapter!
> 
> Saudade- the love that remains when someone or something is gone.


	7. Serendipity

Toshinori was still getting used to the new area.  Nezu had been encouraging him to relocate for years and he had finally accepted the necessity.  Moving allowed him to get used to the area for a while before he eventually started teaching at UA; it was so comparatively restful here that the small part of himself that urged self-care resented him for not moving earlier.  In addition to scaling back his work in Tokyo, Toshinori was adjusting to Musutafu by exploring in his weakened body. The extended walks helped him maintain what strength he could, even when not powered with One for All.

Because of where he had settled, his walks regularly took him by Dagobah beach.  More than once Toshinori had considered cleaning the shore and carting off the trash that had accumulated in last few the decades.  He felt irrationally guilty that the beach had been trashed during his absence from the city.

With his power so limited these days, taking time to clean the coast would be selfish.  He ran his time limit to the edge every single day. Even if other people would enjoy the cleaned beach, it would feel small next to the importance of saving lives.  Saving his power for the latter was the _heroic_ decision.  In his powered down form, he would not be able to safely deal with the larger debris at all.

‘Maybe I can convince Nezu to make it a training exercise for UA students,’ he considered as he turned towards the beach. Trying to marshal different arguments he could make to the clever principal, Toshinori’s thoughts slowly ground to a halt as his mind registered what he was looking at.

Instead of a trash-filled horizon, a large tent covered the entrance to the beach area.  The cloth was a mixture of hues seemly woven together; Toshinori couldn’t spot any seams at all. The tent stood rigidly, the fabric standing stiffly in spite of the brisk morning wind.  

Toshinori stopped to listen, but he couldn’t hear anything coming from within the tent.  Moving closer, he peered around the structure to look at the trash-laden beach. He was surprised to see a young teenager with green hair caught in a half ponytail slowly dragging a refrigerator towards the tent.

Toshinori heard the young man muttering under his breath as he strained against the dead weight of the ruined appliance.  Given the task at hand and the age of the worker, Toshinori figured he probably didn’t want to know the contents of the muttering.  He would hate to reflexively try to correct foul language from someone already performing a thankless task.

Not wanting to interrupt the boy, Toshinori glanced around until he saw a relatively low concrete pylon.  He took a seat and watched the boy finish dragging the refrigerator into the tent. He heard a sharp sound, a crackle of electricity, and then silence.  Then the same boy trotted back out to the shore, presumably looking around for something new to move.

Toshinori was intrigued; clearly, the boy was using some sort of quirk to do _something_ , but beyond that very general conclusion, he had no clue what was going on.  And he had to admit that he was curious. It was a school day, and the boy looked young enough that he should be heading to class, yet here he was.

He waited until the boy came back, this time carrying a microwave that had the glass busted out of it.   The boy’s shoulders were slumped slightly as he carried the appliance, and his gaze was fixed on the ground.  
  
“Excuse me,” Toshinori called, trying to sound jovial to counterbalance his gaunt appearance. It would be nice to have a conversation with someone that wasn't focused on his health, but there was only so much he could do to disguise the fact that he was obviously unwell.

The boy continued into the tent, not looking up, but he grunted “just a second,” as he passed by Toshinori’s seat.  He stopped with his arms just inside the tent, with his feet still planted in the sand. Toshinori heard the thud of the microwave dropping to the ground.  Then the boy turned, shaking his arms as though to relieve the ache.

“Can I help you, sir?” he asked with a certain air of forced politeness.

“I noticed that you were dragging trash into the tent, and I have to admit I’m curious,” Toshinori answered, making sure to keep his voice friendly rather than accusing.

The boy’s voice was entirely deadpan as he responded, “well, I'm cleaning up the beach.”  The _obviously_ was unspoken.

Toshinori smiled in spite of himself.  “Yes, that I could tell,” the banter was fun- so few people spoke to him like this, like he was human rather than broken.

“Glad I could help with your curiosity then.”

“Let me ask a more exact question then- what exactly are you doing with the debris you move into the tent?” Toshinori pressed, not wanting to walk away just yet.

“I'm not violating any public quirk use laws,” the boy responded defensively.  “Does that satisfy your curiosity?”

Toshinori raised his eyebrows at the certainty in the boy’s voice.  “Aren’t you? This is after all public property.”

The boy sighed and bent down to rummage through a backpack that had been left next to the tent door. “I should have posted this, but it slipped my mind,” he muttered as pulled out a stiff sheet of paper.  He walked over and handed it to Toshinori.

He looked at the paper. “Permit for seasonal rental and temporary structure,” he read out loud.  Closer examination confirmed that the seals were from the government permit office and made out for one Midoriya Izuku.

The boy reached out to take the paper from Toshinori’s grasp.  “As you can see, I have official permission for a seasonal rental here at Dagobah Beach.  What I do inside the temporary structure falls within private property restrictions so long as it’s not visible to anyone else.”

“I see, very clever, young man. Can I ask you what you're actually doing, for my own curiosity if nothing else?” Truly, this minor mystery was more fun than he’d had in his weakened form in quite some time.

The boy bit his lip consideringly while glaring out towards the horizon.  The glare, though seemingly well-practiced was remarkably cute- it reminded him of a kitten. Toshinori held back a smile; he’d hate to step on the poor boy’s feelings by appearing to not take him seriously.

Finally, the boy nodded to himself.  He walked slowly to Toshinori’s perch and carefully bowed politely in greeting.  “Midoriya Izuku, it is nice to meet you.”

To his own surprise, Toshinori immediately offered, “Yagi Toshinori.”  Rather than dwell on the fact that he offered his full name, Toshinori slid down from the pylon and offered his own bow.  “It is a pleasure Midoriya-kun.”

Midoriya turned and gestured Toshinori into the tent.  “Why don’t you come watch? It’s...well, just saying that I was cleaning the beach wasn’t enough apparently.  Seeing would be faster.”

Toshinori nodded.  “Thank you, Midoriya-kun. I am quite curious. Seeing people use their quirks to help others is always rewarding.” He moved towards the tent, watching his feet so he didn’t accidentally stub his toes on the dropped microwave as he entered. Toshinori noted that the tent was surprisingly well lit.  The cloth, though opaque from the outside, let in a fair amount of light as well as a breeze. There were bars of metal and other unidentifiable materials stacked against the far wall. A surprisingly ornate desk and chair were pushed against one side of the tent. A scattering of notebooks, school workbooks, and textbooks littered the surface of the desk along with what looked like a battery-powered lantern that was currently turned off.

The rest of the tent was empty.  Surprisingly, it was tall enough to let him stand up straight, even if he stretched out of his habitual slouch. He wondered how the structure worked- from what he could see, the supports for the tent were embedded into the fabric somehow, leaving a large, open area.

Midoriya followed him into the tent, shoving the microwave further into the enclosure as he went.  Toshinori noted approvingly that the boy was careful to stay out of reach and that Midoriya watched him with a healthy degree of wariness.  Cautious, but still friendly. He also noted that the boy kept his right arm between the two of them. It was a deliberate movement, something to do with his quirk perhaps?

Toshinori waited patiently, wondering exactly what the boy was going to do with the microwave.  He appeared to examine the microwave carefully, then clapped. Energy crackled around Midoriya and his hand darted out to touch the broken glass part of the microwave. The glass flowed together and a solid lump fell to the ground.  

A series of claps and touches followed until the microwave was gone and only the raw materials lay in the sand. When he finished, Midoriya straightened and looked slightly hesitantly up towards Toshinori.

The hesitance was alarming. It was a powerful quirk and the boy controlled it so carefully, surely he had received positive feedback before?  Still, Toshinori went with his gut and reacted with an exuberance more associated with All Might.

“That was amazing young man! Such excellent control and wonderful results.  Are they safe to touch?” Toshinori was surprised to see Midoriya’s intense blush.

Smiling now, Midoriya plucked up two of the pieces and handed them over.  The glass was the size of a large marble and surprisingly heavy. Toshinori held it up, trying to gauge its clarity.  Light from the side of the tent startled him; Midoriya had flipped on the lamp while Toshinori was occupied.

The glass was perfectly clear. “No impurities in the glass?” he asked absently.  It was so rare that he had the opportunity to learn in this fashion. As All Might people were either too intimidated to respond or fell all over themselves to provide any and all information.  And as Toshinori, few people were inclined to spend time indulging his curiosity.

“No, it’s pure fused quartz.  The transmutation allowed me to isolate the silica.”

“Transmutation?” Asked Toshinori as he examined the other material Midoriya had handed to him.  Unlike the glass, he was unable to determine what it was other than some sort of metal. “Is that the name of your quirk?”

“Yup,” the boy chirped happily, “registered it under that name just last week!”

Toshinori sucked in a breath too harshly and began to cough.  He could feel blood spattering past his lips while he dropped the microwave parts to try and cover his mouth.  Pain burst through his body as he hunched over, his ruined lung searing in his chest. The coughing didn’t stop until a small hand offered him a handkerchief while another began gently rubbing his back until the tremors ended.

“Thank you, my boy, I’m sorry for the response, I was just startled and my body doesn’t react to that as well as it used to.”  Toshinori refused to look up while he wiped his lips with the now stained cloth. The hand on his back fell as the boy left to go dig around in the backpack fetched from outside. He was both surprised and grateful that other than wringing his hands in apparent worry, the boy did not react even more to Toshinori's dramatic episode. The expected questions never materialized. Midoriya seemed far more concerned with making sure Toshinori was comfortable instead.

“It’s not a problem,” Midoriya rushed to assure him as he handed over a bottle of water.  A slight stutter in his voice was apparent as he continued, “I was just, well...I was excited to tell someone about it. You know, other than my mom and the quirk counselor.”  Toshinori gratefully drank some water to ease his throat before he looked at his young benefactor. 

Well, his first explanation, that the quirk registry had to be updated as the quirk evolved was probably not correct with that level of nervous excitement.  He wanted to ask why Midoriya hadn’t told anyone else. But a considering look at the boy was answer enough; he was far older than most kids activating their quirk, and Toshinori vividly remembered being the quirkless kid.  Instead, Toshinori offered, “I’m honored to have seen it.” The boy relaxed at the words, so Toshinori continued, “please, can you tell me more? You break down objects to their component parts, yet the name Transmutation suggests something extra,” he stated leadingly.

The boy visibly brightened at the open interest. Obviously, he was excited to talk about his quirk and happy that Toshinori had noticed the nuance.

“No, decomposition is just one part of it! Actually, it’s not even the first part,” he continued.  The boy began pushing up his sleeves as he explained, gesturing towards the piles of material Toshinori spotted when he entered the tent.  “The first step is comprehension.”

Toshinori was listening, but his eye was also caught on an odd bracer that covered the entirety of the young man’s right forearm.  It appeared to be metal and closely fitted to the skin. He forced himself to table that curiosity as Midoriya continued to talk.

“I have to understand the inherent structure and properties of the particular material I want to work with before I do anything else.  That understanding is what lets me break down objects. But comprehension and deconstruction are just the first two steps. There is so much more.”

There was something terribly fragile in the silence that filled the tent after that pronouncement.  Hoping he was reading the cues correctly, Toshinori honestly responded, “I’d love to see more.”

There was sunshine in the wide smile the boy offered at that encouragement.  

Midoriya gestured to the chair by the desk, “please, sit.  It’s easier to show than just explain, and there’s no reason for you to be uncomfortable if you’re actually going to stay for more than just the initial demonstration with the microwave.”

Toshinori sat, and it was immediately apparent that the chair, while perfect for the adolescent boy, was far too small for his own lanky frame.

Midoriya glared furiously at the chair, his ears slowly reddening as he took in just how small it was compared to Toshinori.  The boy’s fists clenched and his jaw tightened; just as Toshinori was certain that Midoriya was going to verbalize some sort of response to the juxtaposition, he forcefully shook his shoulders loose and turned to look at the stack of materials Toshinori had already noticed.

“How tall are you, Yagi-san?” he asked distractedly while pulling out various pieces and piling it haphazardly in the middle of the tent.

“Just a bit over seven feet, Midoriya-kun,” he answered, “truthfully, nearly all chairs are small for me.”  He hoped that last (truthful) statement helped stem whatever annoyance had been brewing in the lad’s head.

Rather than responding, the boy simply nodded and piled a bit more on his stack of materials.  Finally satisfied with what he had chosen, Midoriya looked at Toshinori, squinted slightly in thought, then clapped his hands together.

Leaning forward in interest, Toshinori was not prepared for the result as Midoriya slammed his hands into the objects he had chosen.  

Power writhed around the boy in crackles of blueish energy, brighter and louder than in his initial demonstrations.  Metal twisted under his hands, joined by the other substances that the boy had chosen. In the bright flare of the change, Toshinori could barely make out the shape of what was being formed under the careful control of the boy’s quirk.

Toshinori blinked.  When his eyes opened again, a large chair sat in the middle of the tent.  In spite of himself, he clapped in approval. “That was amazing Midoriya-kun!” he cheered.

This time Toshinori expected Midoriya’s blush. The poor boy didn’t seem to know how to react to the genuine praise.

“May I look at it more closely?” Toshinori asked, trying to smooth past the moment.

Apparently, Midoriya didn’t trust himself to speak, because he only nodded and waved Toshinori forward.

The structure of the chair was elegantly curved, silvery metal.  Toshinori noted that the cross-bracing looked sturdy enough to support his weight at full power.  He couldn’t identify the rest of the materials. It looked as though they had been woven together to cover the furniture’s metal skeleton.  When he reached out to touch it, he still could not quite determine _what_ the seat and back were made of, other than something sturdy, flexible, and surprisingly soft to the touch.

Altogether, the chair was perfect for Toshinori’s height, and would probably cost a fortune at a furniture store.

“Truly impressive.  Will it last, or will the materials revert back to their previous shape?” Toshinori asked as he carefully tested the weight of the chair.  To his shock, it lifted easily, even under his weakened strength. “What on earth is this made of, Midoriya-kun? Were all the materials from the beach? Is it as sturdy as it looks, even with it being so light?” he asked before the boy could even answer his first question.

Toshinori looked up as the boy snorted a laugh. “It’s odd to hear a stream of questions from the other side,” he said quietly to himself. “Sit down, try it before you praise it Yagi-san.”

Toshinori nodded in agreement as he prodded the chair carefully.  Finally, he lowered himself into the chair.

It was amazingly comfortable.  His feet touched the ground without his knees protruding beyond the seat.  The fabric cradled his form and when he leaned backward, the frame shifted smoothly to lower the backrest while still supporting his weakened chest. None of the chairs in his apartment were this comfortable; _which probably is a sign I need new furniture,_ he thought ruefully. “Can I keep this?” he asked seriously.

“Of course, you’re welcome to keep it, Yagi-san! To answer your other questions, no the materials will not revert- the new structure is fixed.  The frame is made of a titanium alloy, a variation of Titanium 10V-2Fe-3Al,” the boy rattled off the name. “But unlike the traditional alloy, it has nano-spaced stacking faults from an alloy made of magnesium, gadolinium, yttrium, silver, and zirconium.  The stacking faults provide extra strength and decrease the overall weight significantly.”

Toshinori had plenty of experience listening to support item developers speak about material sciences, and this was on David Shield’s level of enthusiasm and technical babble.  He wondered if he should put the young lad in contact with his old friend. Maybe once he got to know the lad a bit better he'd make the suggestion.  David would probably appreciate him reaching out.

Midoriya continued, “this is my first time trying to make the fabric though.  It’s an Ultra-High Molecular Weight Polyethylene made with long oriented molecular chains, so it’s incredibly strong but lightweight.”

The boy rushed on, seemly eager to have an audience, “the raw materials were all supplied from trash on the beach.  As I mentioned before, the key is understanding the structure of the trash that was there and how to shift it into the form I wanted.”

The words kept spilling out,  “You see, I take a piece of junk like that busted microwave,” he gestured at the lumps that remained of the discarded appliance, “and I make sure I comprehend the basic components; you watched me deconstruct the pieces to the component parts.”  Midoriya kicked the lumps Toshinori had dropped back over to the other pieces. The boy clapped and touched the remains of the microwave. They spun together and formed a delicate looking stand, just the right height to sit next to the new chair and hold various odds and ends.  “And then I reconstruct the pieces into what I want, using the materials that are there.”

“Comprehension, Deconstruction, and Reconstruction are the very core steps to Transmutation. What I showed you was just the last two steps separated.  I’m working on making it all seamless, but it’s taking some practice.”

“Truly remarkable,” Toshinori praised. It was. Such a quirk had the potential to be incredibly destructive, and here was this boy, renting space on a beach so he could legally use his quirk, and then using it to perform a public service.

“So why the beach,” Toshinori finally asked. “Obviously it’s a boon to the neighborhood, but I imagine that’s not your only reason.

“Well, I won’t always be able to know exactly what I’m deconstructing,” Midoriya said.  “And I need to learn how to account for that. The trash here on the beach has all sorts of impurities or parts missing, so I’m getting practice without too much risk.”

“What happens if you make a mistake in your transmutation?” Toshinori asked.

“Well, if I try to make something but I don’t have enough materials for what I’m making, I can’t meet the fundamental requirement of Equivalent Exchange.”

“What is Equivalent Exchange? Is it more than just the laws of thermodynamics?” Toshinori asked. The way Midoriya had emphasized the words, the capital letters in Equivalent Exchange were nearly audible; it sounded more significant than just the conservation of energy.

“I don’t think most people would make that connection offhandedly, Yagi-san,” Midoriya commented in surprise.  “But it’s more than just physics.” The boy’s vocal cadence changed as he recited, “Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is alchemy's first law of Equivalent Exchange.”

The boy’s voice cracked slightly as he finished his recitation; his gaze stared bleakly at nothing as sorrow filled his face.  Toshinori looked away, trying to give the poor boy some privacy to mourn. He wondered who had spoken those words to Midoriya and why they brought such grief.

After a long moment, the boy continued, “if I try to do too much with too little, the power rebounds. The forces on either side of the equation try to stabilize themselves, and that can result in unpredictable results or catastrophic failures. It could even initiate a cascading failure if I were to try something too complex.”

“So why not make sure you know exactly what materials you’re working with?”

“If I wanted to work in a lab, that would be an option,” Midoriya agreed. “But that’s not what I’m going to be doing, Yagi-san.”

Toshinori had a feeling he knew the answer but asked anyway. “Why is that, young man? What do you want to do with your life?”

“I’m going to be a hero,” answered Midoriya.

Toshinori smiled happily.  “I can’t wait to see it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this did not go where I expected it to at all. I hope that I've caught the dual sense of loneliness from both of them, as well as the start of their friendship.
> 
> The equivalent exchange quote is from Alphonse. 
> 
> Note bene: Izuku is demonstrating what he feels comfortable showing a stranger.


End file.
